CONSOLIDATING AND IMPROVING VOCABULARY THROUGH COMMUNICATIVE SPEAKING TASKS FOR THE FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS AT THE DEPARTMENT OF FINANCE AND ACCOUNTING, PHUONG DONG UNIVERSITY

FIGURES AND TABLES: Figure 1: The application of communicative speaking tasks in consolidating and improving the students’ vocabulary Figure 2: Types of communicative speaking tasks Figu

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

-

NGHIÊM THỊ HẰNG

CONSOLIDATING AND IMPROVING VOCABULARY THROUGH COMMUNICATIVE SPEAKING TASKS FOR THE FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS AT THE DEPARTMENT OF FINANCE AND

ACCOUNTING, PHUONG DONG UNIVERSITY

(CỦNG CỐ VÀ PHÁT TRIỂN TỪ VỰNG THÔNG QUA NHIỆM VỤ NÓI MANG TÍNH GIAO TIẾP CHO SINH VIÊN NĂM THỨ NHẤT KHOA TÀI CHÍNH – KẾ TOÁN, TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC PHƯƠNG ĐÔNG)

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111

Hanoi, 2014

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

-

NGHIÊM THỊ HẰNG

CONSOLIDATING AND IMPROVING VOCABULARY THROUGH COMMUNICATIVE SPEAKING TASKS FOR THE FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS AT THE DEPARTMENT OF FINANCE AND

ACCOUNTING, PHUONG DONG UNIVERSITY

(CỦNG CỐ VÀ PHÁT TRIỂN TỪ VỰNG THÔNG QUA NHIỆM VỤ NÓI MANG TÍNH GIAO TIẾP CHO SINH VIÊN NĂM THỨ NHẤT KHOA TÀI CHÍNH – KẾ TOÁN, TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC PHƯƠNG ĐÔNG)

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111

Supervisor: Dr Phạm Đăng Bình

Hanoi, 2014

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DECLARATION

I hereby, certify the thesis entitled “Consolidating and Improving Vocabulary through Communicative Speaking Tasks for the First-Year Students at the Department of Finance and Accounting, Phuong Dong University” is the result of

my own research for the Minor Degree of Master of Arts at University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National University, Hanoi The

thesis has not been submitted for any degree at any other universities or institutions

I agree that the origin of my paper deposited in the library can be accessible for the

purposes of study and research

Hanoi, 2014

Nghiêm Thị Hằng

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

First and foremost, I would like to express my great gratitude and indebtedness to my supervisor Dr Pham Dang Binh for his careful instructions, valuable advice and inspiration during the process of this research

My sincere thanks also go to all the English lecturers at the Faculty of Graduate Studies for providing me useful lectures and suggestions that have helped

Post-me much in my study

I would like to extend my deep appreciation to my colleagues and students at Phuong Dong University for their cooperation and support so that I could complete

my necessary data collection for the research

Finally, I wish to thank my family and friends, who have always been by my side to encourage and support me throughout my study Without their help and encouragement, I could not have completed this thesis

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ABSTRACT

T his thesis is to investigate consolidating and improving vocabulary through communicative speaking tasks for the first-year students at the Department of Finance and Accounting, Phuong Dong University In more details, it makes clear the current application of communicative speaking tasks in vocabulary lesson, advantages and disadvantages, and suggestions for more effective use of this technique To achieve these objectives, the researcher uses survey questionnaires and semi-structured group interviews for both the English teachers and the first-year students at the Department of Finance and Accounting The results show that many types of communicative speaking tasks were used to review and develop students’ vocabulary Despite some remaining difficulties, the majority of the participants assumed a great number of strong points of these tasks and desired to apply them in consolidating and improving vocabulary Additionally, their pedagogical suggestions for the effective application of communicative speaking tasks in reviewing and developing vocabulary are presented

FIGURES AND TABLES:

Figure 1: The application of communicative speaking tasks in consolidating and improving the students’ vocabulary

Figure 2: Types of communicative speaking tasks

Figure 3: Difficulties in applying communicative speaking tasks to consolidate and improve students’ vocabulary perceived by teachers

Figure 4: Difficulties in applying communicative speaking tasks to consolidate and improve students’ vocabulary perceived by students

Figure 5: The teachers and the students’ attitude towards the necessity of applying communicative speaking tasks to consolidate and improve students’ vocabulary Table 1: The participants’ interest in the types of communicative speaking tasks (%) Table 2: Advantages of applying communicative speaking tasks to consolidate and improve students’ vocabulary as perceived by the teachers

Table 3: Advantages of applying communicative speaking tasks to consolidate and improve students’ vocabulary as perceived by the students

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii

ABSTRACT iii

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS, FIGURES AND TABLES iv

TABLE OF CONTENTS v

PART I: INTRODUCTION 1

1 Statement of the problem and rationale for the study 1

2 Aims of the study 2

3 Objectives of the study 2

4 Research questions 2

5 Scope of the study 3

6 Significance of the study 3

7 Methodology 3

8 An overview of the rest of the study 4

PART II: DEVELOPMENT 6

CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 6

1.1 Vocabulary 6

1.1.1 Definition of vocabulary 6

1.1.2 The importance of vocabulary 6

1.1.3 Aspects of vocabulary knowledge 7

1.1.4 Stages in teaching vocabulary 8

1.2 Communicative speaking tasks in vocabulary learning 9

1.2.1 Communicative speaking tasks 9

1.2.2 Communicative speaking tasks in vocabulary learning 10

1.2.3 Types of communicative speaking tasks to increase vocabulary knowledge 11

1.3 Previous studies 13

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1.3.1 Foreign researches 13

1.3.2 Vietnamese researches 14

CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY 17

2.1 Participants 17

2.2 Instruments 18

2.3 Data collection procedures 20

2.4 Data analysis procedures 21

CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS 23

3.1 Research Question 1 23

3.2 Research question 2 29

3.3 Research question 3 33

3.4 Research question 4 36

PART III: CONCLUSION 39

1 Recapitulation 39

2 Limitations of the study 42

3 Suggestions for further research 43

REFERENCES 44

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PART I: INTRODUCTION

1 Statement of the problem and rationale for the study

Nowadays, English is widely spoken all over the world and it has become a second language in many countries In the context of Vietnam, the teaching and learning of English have been paid a lot of attention because of its significance in promoting mutual understanding and cooperation between Vietnam and other countries English has recently been taught as a compulsory subject from the third grade However, after several years of learning English, most students still find it hard to communicate with foreigners Even at colleges and universities like Phuong Dong University, teachers have to teach non-major students English from the beginning Many students may be good at English grammar, but they cannot express their ideas in English effectively When asked for the reason, most of them said that it was due to their vocabulary limitation They may know very well the meaning of words when doing exercises, but they can hardly use them in real situations

According to many linguists, in communication, vocabulary is more important than grammar David Wilkin (1972) pointed out “Without grammar very little can be conveyed, without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed” (as cited in Thornbury, 2002:47) Therefore, vocabulary, one of the major components of language, ought to be taken into consideration in both English language teaching and learning However, only focusing on teaching new vocabulary is not the most effective way of handling vocabulary It is more effective if teachers spend time consolidating words the students have learnt before helping them learn more new ones Moreover, students ought to be given more speaking opportunities so that they can be familiar with real life communication To improve students’ vocabulary as well as their speaking ability in real communication, one of the suggested ways is to implement communicative speaking tasks in consolidating and improving the active vocabulary for the students

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All the aforementioned factors have inspired the researcher to conduct a

study named “Consolidating and Improving Vocabulary through Communicative

Speaking Tasks for the First-Year Students at the Department of Finance and Accounting, Phuong Dong University.”

2 Aims of the study

The research aims at finding out whether applying communicative speaking tasks has a positive influence on consolidating and improving vocabulary for the first-year students at the Department of Finance and Accounting, PDU From that, some recommendations for better employments of communicative speaking tasks

in reviewing and developing students’ vocabulary are suggested

3 Objectives of the study

The specific objectives of the research were as follows:

- Investigate how communicative speaking tasks have been applied in consolidating and improving vocabulary for the first-year students at the Department of Finance and Accounting, PDU

- Find out the fundamental advantages of using communicative speaking tasks in consolidating and improving the vocabulary in the teaching and learning process of both the teachers and the students

- Clarify the main difficulties in using communicative speaking tasks in the same context

- Figure out several pedagogical implications for better employments of communicative speaking tasks in the context of consolidating and improving vocabulary for the first year students at PDU

4 Research questions

1 How have communicative speaking tasks been applied by the teachers in consolidating and improving English vocabulary for the first-year students at the Department of Finance and Accounting, PDU?

2 What are the advantages of communicative speaking tasks in consolidating and improving vocabulary as perceived by the teachers and the students?

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3 What are the main difficulties in using communicative speaking tasks in consolidating and improving vocabulary as perceived by the teachers and the students?

4 What are their suggestions for more effective application of communicative speaking tasks in consolidating and improving vocabulary?

5 Scope of the study

Due to the limit of a minor thesis, the study focuses on investigating the uses

of communicative speaking tasks in consolidating and improving vocabulary The samples of the study are also restricted to the English teachers and the first-year students at the Department of Finance and Accounting, PDU

6 Significance of the study

Theoretically, the study is hoped to provide the teachers with useful information of teaching and learning vocabulary in general, and consolidating and improving vocabulary through communicative speaking tasks for the freshmen in particular More importantly, they would have more ideas of the students’ perceptions and desires of this technique In addition, the study could be a reference for other researchers to conduct the study related to this topic

Practically, since the study delves into consolidating and improving vocabulary through communicative speaking tasks, its finding hopefully would contribute to the first-year students’ better use of English as a tool of communication As for the teachers, they could apply these above theories into consolidating and improving the students’ vocabulary Moreover, the study also provides the teachers with some helpful suggestions so that they could take their own initiatives to use communicative speaking tasks effectively in their classroom situations

7 Methodology

7.1 Approach

Survey research was chosen as the primary research method as it meets the aim and objectives of the study Sincero, S M (2012) points out six main advantages

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of survey research namely high representativeness, low costs, convenient data gathering, good statistical significance, little or no observer subjectivity and precise results

7.2 Data collection methods

To find out the answers to the research questions, the researcher employed both survey questionnaires and interviews In detail, two sets of questionnaires were used for 4 teachers and 100 students respectively so that the data about the application of communicative speaking tasks to consolidate and improve vocabulary could be gathered from different viewpoints Moreover, semi-structured group interview questions were applied to get further information from

2 teachers and 4 students of English classes

7.3 Data analysis methods

Firstly, the collected data would be classified according to four research questions The needed combination of gathered responses from both the teachers and the students were to analyze four research questions For each research question, responses were calculated and transferred into numerical forms The data were then clearly presented in the forms of tables and charts to facilitate the synthesis, comparison and generalization of the data The participants’ answers to open-ended questions in questionnaires and interviews would be summarized and presented in the form of quotation and cited if necessary

8 An overview of the rest of the study

This study includes three main parts: Introduction, Development and Conclusion

PART A: INTRODUCTION presents the rationale, the aims, the scope, the

significance, the methods and design of the study

PART B: DEVELOPMENT consists of three chapters:

Chapter 1 (Literature Review) provides the background of the study, including definitions and aspects of key concepts, as well as the review of previous research Chapter 2 (Methodology) describes the participants and instruments of the study, and the procedures employed in the research

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Chapter 3 (Results and Discussions) presents, analyses and discusses the collected data from the questionnaires and interviews

PART C: CONCLUSION summarizes the main issues discussed in the thesis,

the findings that the researcher has found basing on the data collected from the four research questions, the limitations of the research, several pedagogical recommendations concerning the research topic as well as some suggestions for further studies

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PART II: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1 Vocabulary

1.1.1 Definition of vocabulary

There have existed various ways of defining vocabulary in language teaching and learning According to Oxford Advanced Learners’ Dictionary Seventh Edition (2005), vocabulary is “all the words a person knows or uses or all the words in a particular language” Nunan (1999) also shared the same view on vocabulary He stated that vocabulary was a list of target language words

In terms of methodology, Ur (1996:60) said “Vocabulary can be defined roughly as the words we teach in the foreign language However, a new item of vocabulary may be more than a single word and also multi-word idioms.” In this way, vocabulary covers a huge aspect of language and it is the medium to express ideas or opinions

According to Lewis (1993), vocabulary “…may be individual words, or full sentences – institutionalized utterances – that convey fixed or pragmatic meaning within a given community.”

In short, it can be drawn from the above definitions of different views: vocabulary is all the words including a single word or multi-word terms that a language possesses

1.1.2 The importance of vocabulary

In communicative language teaching, vocabulary plays an important role beside grammar, because “lack of grammar knowledge can limit conversation; lack of vocabulary knowledge can stop conversation” (Folse, 2004:3) With poor grammar, learners can still express their ideas; however, with poor vocabulary, communication is constrained considerably In other words, you can get by without grammar but you cannot get by without vocabulary

Harmer (1991) mentioned: “If language structures make up the skeleton of language, then it is vocabulary that provides the vital organs and the flesh to make

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up its perfect body” Therefore, to most of language learners, the acquisition of vocabulary is an important component in the course of language learning Students mastering a variety of vocabulary perform better in the communicative language activities

Regarding to this matter, Wallace (1982) said “Failure to find the words one needs to express himself is the most frustrating experience in speaking another language” It can be seen that vocabulary is the leading factor for learners to gain their target language

As its significance in the foreign language teaching, vocabulary teaching has the goal to help students not only improve but also extend their vocabulary as well The more words one knows well, the more successful he/she is in daily communication and the more information he can get from different sources such

as books, newspapers, etc Therefore, vocabulary deserves an important position in foreign language teaching and learning

1.1.3 Aspects of vocabulary knowledge

The concept of a word can be defined in various ways, but three significant

aspects teachers need to be aware of and focus on are form, meaning, and use (Nation, 2001:27) The form of a word involves its pronunciation (spoken form),

spelling (written form), and any word parts that make up this particular item (such

as a prefix, root, and suffix) The meaning encompasses the way that form and

meaning work together, in other words, the concept and what items it refers to, and the associations that come to mind when people think about a specific word or

expression The use involves the grammatical functions of the word or phrase,

collocations that normally go with it, and finally any constraints on its use, in terms of frequency, level, and so forth

Ur (1999:60-62) and Harmer (1991:156-157) agreed on listing the fundamental features, which need to be included within vocabulary teaching Beside knowing the form of word, learners also need to be familiar with its

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grammar Other aspects in teaching vocabulary are word formation, denotation and connotation

In order to master vocabulary, learners not only need to learn the components

of language, such as grammar, spelling, or pronunciation, but they must also pay attention to multiple aspects of vocabulary knowledge, including polysemy, connotation and usage, part of speech, frequency, and collocation (Folse, 2008)

To sum up, all these above aspects of vocabulary should be taught to language learners The more aspects of word knowledge one knows about a word, the more likely he/she will be able to use it in right contexts in an appropriate manner

1.1.4 Stages in teaching vocabulary

Basically as proposed by Gower (2005) and Thornbury (2002), there are three stages in teaching vocabulary namely Presenting, Practicing and Revising Presenting vocabulary refers to pre-planned lesson stages in which learners are taught pre-selected vocabulary items (Thornbury, 2002) To present new items,

it is important to show the meaning of the words as well as the form in which it is used There are several ways to present new items, such as using translation, which is the most direct route to a word’s meaning, illustrating the meaning by using pictures, mime or realia, etc to teach beginners; contextualizing, defining, giving synonyms, antonyms or giving detailed descriptions which are suitable for advanced learners

After presenting the words, practicing of these words is necessary To do that, many different kinds of tasks could be implemented in order to move the words into long term memory, the one a learner has to activate to retrieve the words when necessary (Thornbury, 2002) Among these classroom activities, teachers can use some decision making ones like identifying, selecting, matching, sorting, ranking and sequencing And also production tasks, for instance, completion of sentences and texts and creation of sentences and texts

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The last stage is related to the production stage with the aim of helping students incorporate the new items into the lexicon This can be done by using communicative activities in which the learners have to retrieve the vocabulary already learnt and practiced

1.2 Communicative speaking tasks in vocabulary learning

1.2.1 Communicative speaking tasks

According to Willis (1996:36), a communicative task is a “goal oriented communicative activity with a specific outcome, where the emphasis is on exchanging meanings not producing specific language forms”

Estaire & Zanon (1994:13-20) indicated that a communicative task was a piece of classroom work which, as far as possible, resembled activities which our students or other people carried out in everyday life, thus reproducing processes of everyday communication A piece of classroom work which involved learners in comprehending, manipulating, producing or interacting in the target language while their attention was principally focused on meaning rather than form The task should also have a sense of completeness, being able to stand alone as a communicative act in its own right Furthermore, Lambert (2004:18-27) defined communication tasks as pedagogic tasks which operated through a planned diversion in the information held by learners, and which usually approximated to some degree to a real world task which learners had to complete outside class Communicative speaking tasks are considered communicative activities, real-world tasks or real-world connection given with the aim of providing students chance to express their own ideas orally about the topic of the lesson These ideas are based on the analysis of meaning derived from a communicative activity Communicative speaking tasks normally refer to pair work or group work in which each member has exclusive access to information about the result of a problem-solving activity

In summary, communicative speaking tasks empower students by allowing them to take charge of their own learning and to communicate their knowledge to others in authentic ways

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1.2.2 Communicative speaking tasks in vocabulary learning

Communication tasks have a well-established place within many language learning programs Although the range of types of such tasks is large, all provide learners with opportunities to use language to do things and, in particular, to engage in meaningful interactive oral language production Research carried out in recent years indicates that there may also be a role for vocabulary learning either

as an incidental goal or as one of the primary goals of a communication activity Hall (1992) found that the vocabulary learning of students working on these interactive tasks was greater than that of students working within a teacher-fronted arrangement with a reading focus Hall suggested that the requirement for spoken output in these tasks and the generative use of new vocabulary items were the key factors leading to acquisition of these items

Simcock (1993) also suggested a role for incidental vocabulary learning when the learners’ focus was primarily on meaningful performance of a communicative speaking task

The researches provided evidence for improved vocabulary recognition and use both indirectly, as a result of exposure to new vocabulary in a meaningful communicative context, and directly as a result of communicative work on targeted vocabulary

In conclusion, there are some reasons for using communicative speaking tasks for consolidating and improving learners’ vocabulary knowledge Firstly, the face-to-face nature of communication in group activities can help speakers to set their speech to a suitable level for the particular listeners and to adjust it when listeners indicate a lack of understanding Secondly, communicative speaking tasks generally provide a meaningful context within which to encounter new vocabulary Thirdly, there is a good chance learners will also be exposed to repeated use of the new items during the course of the task Lastly, having encountered the new items, learners are likely to be required to use them productively in the communicative speaking tasks If this requires learners to use

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vocabulary in ways that are not rote repetition of the way the vocabulary appeared

in the input task, learning will be much greater (Hall, 1992)

1.2.3 Types of communicative speaking tasks to increase vocabulary knowledge

Several classifications of communicative speaking tasks have been proposed Nation (2001:129-138) mentioned some activities that helped learners gain control

of knowledge and also encouraged them to produce vocabulary, namely semantic mapping, making decisions, information transfer activities, split information tasks, ranking, retelling and role play

Schmitt & McCarthy (1997:254-255) suggested some types of communicative speaking tasks such as role-play, information gap, discussion and interview Although dialogues have the advantage of putting words directly into productive vocabulary (Nation, 2001), role-play which is a similar but less structured technique is an option for spontaneous oral practice of vocabulary In addition, having students discuss or retell a selection is another common technique which quite naturally results in students’ repeating vocabulary and chunking words (Allen and Allen, 1985) Finally, variations on the oral interview provide a range of communicative practice with target vocabulary Students can share one-on-one how a word relates to personal experience, rotate to new partners, or snowball to increasingly larger groups

Furthermore, Harmer (1983, as cited in Bygate, 1987:71) identified six types

of oral communication tasks as follows:

- Reaching a consensus: Consensus is defined as "an opinion or position reached by

a group as a whole" by the American Heritage Dictionary (4th edition) Consensus decision making is the process used to generate widespread agreement within a group Examples of this kind of activity include selecting ten objects for a journey; arguing about moral dilemmas; discussing reading comprehension

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- Relaying instructions: One group learns a dance, or build a model (with Lego, for instance), and then the group’s members instruct others, without using the original instructions

- Problem solving: Groups are given a problem situation, for example, they have to imagine that they have survived a plane crash in a desert; with some tools and limited survival rations, they must decide what to do

- Interpersonal exchange: In pairs or small groups, students find out about some aspects of each other’s experience or interests

- Story construction: Each student is given a different picture, and groups are

to compose a story together The pictures may be from different stories or sources

- Simulation and role play: gives students opportunities to communicate in different social contexts and in different social roles The students in the class are divided into pairs or groups and given contexts and roles to act out The roles can

be shopkeeper, policeman, interviewer, etc who can be in different moods such as bold or frightened, irritated or amused, etc Situations are usually true to life, so the speech is close to authentic discourse The role play nature of the tasks encourages generative use of the vocabulary in which learners need to read about the background to the problem, the problem, the constraints on the solution and their roles to act well Examples include individual role cards for a travel agent and a customer; for five students arranging to meet for a meal; for two interviewers and four candidates for a job; a policeman and four witnesses of a monster in Loch Ness; and art gallery officials and several members of the public choosing a new picture for the gallery

In conclusion, different scholars classified communicative speaking tasks using different terms All of these tasks may be used to expose students to new vocabulary as well as to reactivate vocabulary in the iterative process words need

to go through in order for long-term retention to take place Among these above categories, Harmer classified the types of communicative speaking tasks clearly

1.3.1 Foreign researches

Vygotsky (1978:123) stated that language developed mainly from social interaction and a supportive interactive environment could promote learners to a higher level of knowledge and performance However, for most second language learners, they did not have so many opportunities to communicate with others in target language and their most time to learn second language is in classroom Therefore, focusing on the interaction in classroom was important and necessary For the purpose of English vocabulary learning, students learnt it to communicate, such as listening to others, talking with others, negotiating meanings in context Through interaction, students could enlarge the vocabulary size

Jue (2010) implemented a study which aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of Communicative Language Teaching in English vocabulary teaching and learning

in a comprehensive class in southern Sweden From the findings, it could be concluded that Communicative Language Teaching was effective in English vocabulary teaching and learning in many aspects Particularly, it helped develop learners’ communicative proficiency, made them acquire vocabulary knowledge naturally, motivated them to learn and increased cooperation among group members, etc Nevertheless, it required the professional skills and competence of teachers Thus, teachers should enhance their standard in order to improve the effects in practical teaching

Newton (1995) conducted a research named “task-based interaction and incidental vocabulary learning” This case study examined the vocabulary gains

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made by an adult learner of English as a second language as a result of performing four communication tasks Gains were measured on comparisons of pre- and post-tests of vocabulary from the worksheets from the four tasks These gains were discussed in relation to the interactional processes involving unfamiliar vocabulary While this result might, to some extent, be an artifact of test design, it was also true that when the group actively used vocabulary which was unfamiliar

to the subject of this study, the embedding of this vocabulary in the context of the task and its interactive use were likely to have provided not only important information about word meaning but also the conditions whereby that meaning could be acquired The placement of a word on task worksheets and the nature of a task, whether a split information task or a shared information task, both had a strong effect on use and acquisition of new vocabulary

In Wu’s research of incidental English vocabulary studying in L2 learning,

he found that teachers tended to teach English vocabulary by organizing role play and discussion (2009) In addition, Nation gave the scope of incidental activities in classroom, such as retelling, ranking and so on (2001:135) He also did some studies on learning vocabulary through speaking (2001:125) Boyd Zimmerman (1997a:121-140) conducted a study on the impact of interactive vocabulary teaching in vocabulary knowledge, and from the research, they confirmed that the recasts and repetition were the better ones Groot (2000:60-81) expressed that many learners could not master a large amount of English vocabulary due to lack

of exposure to new words with sufficient time Therefore, this would hinder the creation of sufficient number of associations and linked with other words for solid storage and efficient retrieval

1.3.2 Vietnamese researches

Hoang (2012) conducted a study entitled “The effectiveness of presenting and practicing new vocabulary in minimal context for second-year non English major students at Vietnam University of Commerce” to investigate the efficiency

of teaching vocabulary in minimal context, in terms of the second-year non

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English major students’ vocabulary knowledge improvement and motivation in acquiring vocabulary; as well as find out several advantages of minimal context brought about the vocabulary learning and teaching, then propose some pedagogical implications for the teachers at the research site An action research was implemented in the author’s class of 40 second-year non English major students at VUC during two weeks (5 periods) and data were collected and generated by pre-test and post-test, questionnaires and observations The findings highlighted students’ improvement in vocabulary knowledge and high motivation

in the vocabulary lesson using minimal context to present and involve students in practicing new vocabulary In addition, the study indicated a range of benefits to students’ language study, pedagogy and strategy in vocabulary instruction and learning Thus, to motivate and improve students’ vocabulary knowledge, teacher should adapt the vocabulary teaching technique by using minimal context and following the suggested vocabulary practice activities to assist students to enrich their vocabulary knowledge

Vu (2013) chose dialogues as a technique to teach vocabulary for year non-English major students at Hanoi University of Industry The aim of this research was to investigate the effect of this technique to students’ vocabulary acquisition To reach this aim, the writer conducted an action research with 30 students from the class, H3 during four weeks in the second semester of the year 2011-2012 Pre-test, post-test and group interview were used as the data collection instrument The result of this research from tests and interview could be concluded that this teaching technique was highly appreciated by these experimental students because this new technique was of great help to them in acquiring vocabulary In the light of those findings, the researcher suggested several recommendations that were hoped to help syllabus designers, supervisors and English language teachers

second-in developsecond-ing teachsecond-ing vocabulary

Nguyen (2013) examined the comparative effectiveness of task-based approach in teaching ESP vocabulary to second year non-major students at

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Construction School No4 In order to achieve this objective, a quasi-experiment was carried out The research results proved that tasks used during the process of teaching ESP vocabulary were effective in motivating students to learn ESP vocabulary In addition, applying this method could reduce students’ anxiety and improve their self-confidence However, one of the noteworthy findings in this study was how to train students who objected to this instruction or lack of individual or group responsibility so that these students could get familiar and interested in it, which would bring them better results in learning ESP vocabulary like other students Moreover, more related materials to this subject also contributed to success of implementing this instruction

Additionally, many other researches were conducted for purposes such as finding out problems faced by first-year students in developing vocabulary for speaking in different subject areas (Nguyen, 2011), examining the comparative effectiveness of some CLT approach classroom activities in teaching vocabulary (Nguyen, 2008), searching the ways to improve the teaching of vocabulary (Tran, 2007), etc However, in the thesis limit, only studies involving my study purpose are focused, and they have been really good reference for my research

In short, the results from the above studies indicate that the techniques play

an important role in learners’ vocabulary acquisition, and make it easier and more effective for learners to increase their vocabulary knowledge However, studying new vocabulary can only be perfect when it is combined with the practice and is connected to the students’ real world in some way

SUMMARY

In this chapter, the researcher has elaborately discussed the theoretical basis

of the study by defining and clarifying the various aspects in the hope of providing

an important background for the discussion of the collected data later The following chapter will display the methodology and findings of the research under the light of the above-mentioned theories

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CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY

The previous chapter has provided a necessary theoretical background for the present study This chapter presents the methodology used for the data collection and analysis in the study It starts with the description of the participants It then describes data collection instruments and analysis procedures of the study

The first-year students are the subject of the study for some reasons Firstly, the semesters in the first year are very important to students because of its significant role in building basic knowledge for their next semesters In addition, the first-year students are considered newcomers in university They come from different provinces, so their English levels are various Although they have learnt English for several years before, only a small percentage of students can use English to communicate well The other students can understand teachers’ instructions, but they find it hard to speak out In fact, they do not know how to express their ideas in English Therefore, it is really necessary to narrow the gap between high-level students and low-level ones and reach a standard of English for all students before graduation The training quality of these students is always of great concern to teachers at PDU The findings of the study would provide essential information for teachers to improve PDU students' vocabulary and speaking proficiency as well, and hence contribute to enhancing the overall training quality of these students

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2.1.2Teachers

As regards the teachers, currently, there are 5 English teachers including the researcher herself being in charge of teaching English to the first-year students at the department of Finance and Accounting However, to assure the objective opinions, only four teachers were chosen to be the participants All of them are energetic and are willing to devote their time and energy to teaching They were delivered survey questionnaire and interviewed to share their opinions and experience on how to consolidate and improve students’ vocabulary though communicative speaking tasks effectively

2.2 Instruments

The major instruments employed in this study are survey questionnaires and

semi-structured interviews for both the teachers and the students

2.2.1 Questionnaires

Initially, the researcher makes use of questionnaires, a very popular tool of collecting data There are a few advantages to use survey questionnaire as a research method "The main attraction of questionnaires is their unprecedented efficiency in terms of (a) researcher time, (b) researcher effort, and (c) financial resources." (Zoltan Dornyei, 2003:9) Also, Selinger and Shohany (1989) pointed out the following advantages of questionnaires Firstly, they do not take so much time to administer as other procedures Secondly, since the same questionnaire is given to all subjects at the same time, the data are more uniform, standard and accurate Lastly, questionnaires can be easily quantified because multiple choice questions are used Because of these advantages, questionnaire is employed as a main data collection method in this study

There were two sets of questionnaire used in this study, one for the teachers and the other one for the first-year students at the Department of Finance and Accounting, PDU These questionnaires consisted of two main parts: personal information and survey questions The first one asked for the participants’ background information such as their ages, genders, the number of years teaching

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or learning English, etc The second part with close and open-ended questions was

to answer research questions In more details, the first 2 questions used multiple choice ones aimed to find out if communicative speaking tasks had been applied in consolidating and improving vocabulary, and in particular what types communicative speaking tasks were often used Then it was a 5-point Likert question to rate the participants’ interest in the types of communicative speaking tasks After that, in the teachers’ survey questionnaire, the researcher added an open-ended question on how the teachers applied communicative speaking tasks to consolidate and improve the students’ vocabulary Two other questions used 5-point Likert scale to measure the participants' advantages and disadvantages of applying communicative speaking tasks to consolidate and improve vocabulary The next one was a multiple choice question for the participants to assess whether communicative speaking tasks were effective in consolidating and improving vocabulary The last question was an open-ended one seeking for their suggestions for more effective application of communicative speaking tasks to consolidate and improve students’ vocabulary In conclusion, there were 8 questions for the teachers, but 7 questions for the students to get data for analysis (See Appendix 1A and 1B)

2.2.2 Interviews

The researcher chooses interviews as another source of data collection to assure the validity and reliability of the data collected for the study As interviews are interactive, the researcher can “elicit additional data if initial answers are vague, incomplete, off-topic or not specific enough” (Mackey and Grass, 2005:173) It is noted that they are all semi-structured interviews and the questions are all open-ended, which encourage the interviewees to expand upon their answers, give more details or add additional perspectives around the topic Moreover, the semi-structured group interviews are carried out in groups in which people may interrupt one another or “help one another out,” or not take turns They may get off the topic completely Additionally, the interview is tape-

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recorded and the important points throughout the interview are noted down, which

is useful for later interpretation

The interviews in this thesis were carried out with both the teachers and the students to get further opinions of the types of communicative speaking tasks, together with their advantages, disadvantages and suggestions However, the interview for the students was conducted in Vietnamese because their level of English is not high and they cannot tell the whole truth Then their answers for the interviews were translated into English Particularly, there were 6 interview questions in which the first 2 questions were to ask the participants what communicative speaking tasks were often used to consolidate and improve students’ vocabulary, and the frequency of using them This is followed by asking how these communicative speaking tasks were applied under the perspective of the teachers and the students Finally, the questions were to get the subjects’ comments on the advantages and difficulties of using these communicative speaking tasks, and to give useful suggestions for effective application of communicative speaking tasks to consolidate and improve students’ vocabulary (See Appendix 2A and 2B)

2.3 Data collection procedures

The procedure of data collection consists of three main stages as follows: Stage 1: In this stage, the questionnaires for students and teachers were constructed and edited carefully After that, they were modified and piloted with some respondents to ensure that both of their content and structures could be suitable to respondents Then, the researcher would contact the English teachers who taught 4 first-year groups so as to invite both the teachers and the students to participate in the survey questionnaire and the interview It is noted that, all of respondents’ personal information were assured to be particularly kept confidential

by the researcher

Stage 2: 4 copies of the first questionnaire for the English teachers and 100 copies for the students were delivered to the target population The researcher also gave

The semi-structured group interviews with the teachers and students were conducted after the data of the survey questionnaire were analyzed The purpose of these interviews was to affirm the results as well as to hold the opinions of teachers and students of communicative speaking tasks in hope of consolidating and improving the students’ vocabulary Also, the researcher used the recorder to collect and keep needed information and data Similar to the survey questionnaire, the interviewer started to introduce her study, provide the brief explanation of the format of the interview before recording it During the interview, the respondents were encouraged to share their subjective opinions, experiences and give specific examples so that in-depth information could be achieved

2.4 Data analysis procedures

The procedure of data analysis encompasses three main following stages: Stage 1: After the survey questionnaires had been delivered to the participants, the returned data were combined and cleaned before the analysis As for the open-ended questions, the researcher wrote down the ideas that the respondents had given

Stage 2: In this stage, the data collected from the survey questionnaires were described through pie charts and graphs, analyzed and synthesized

Stage 3: After being transcribed, relevant and important ideas collected from the interview were analyzed and used as illustrations of the data analysis to answer the research questions

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SUMMARY

In conclusion, this chapter has just discussed the methodology applied in this study including the research design, the participants, the instruments and procedures of data collection and analysis It is severed as an important step to the next part which specifies results and discussions

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CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

In this chapter, the collected data from survey questionnaires and interviews are going to be analyzed and discussed at the same time in order to get the answers

to four research questions

3.1 Research Question 1: How have communicative speaking tasks been applied by the teachers in consolidating and improving English vocabulary for the first-year students at the Department of Finance and Accounting, PDU?

3.1.1 The current application of communicative speaking tasks in consolidating and improving the first-year students’ vocabulary

There are many techniques applied by teachers to teach students’ vocabulary However, this study mainly focuses on consolidating and improving vocabulary through communicative speaking tasks Therefore, the first survey question was to find out if communicative speaking tasks had been used by teachers in order to review and develop vocabulary for the first-year students at the department of Finance and Accounting, PDU

Figure 1: The application of communicative speaking tasks in consolidating

and improving the students’ vocabulary

No Yes

It is clear from the chart that all of 4 surveyed teachers employed communicative speaking tasks in recycling and increasing their students’ vocabulary When being asked the same question, 94% of the freshmen said that these kinds of task had ever been used by their English teachers The rest said that the tasks applied by their teacher were not similar to the types of communicative

In responding to the first interview question about the frequency of using communicative speaking tasks to consolidate and improve students’ vocabulary, two teachers stated that communicative speaking tasks were often applied in their vocabulary lessons Teacher A said that she tried to employ “the most communicative speaking tasks… weekly” In addition, these tasks were not only used in teacher B’s vocabulary lesson but they were also integrated into other English language skills

In comparison to the teachers’ answers, the interviewed students affirmed that their teachers usually applied these communicative speaking tasks in vocabulary lessons “Actually, communicative speaking tasks are the most popular way that my teacher applies to consolidate and improve vocabulary”, student S3 said

From the results, it could be concluded that there was the presence of communicative speaking tasks with the aims of consolidating and improving the students’ vocabulary More importantly, these tasks were used with quite high frequency in the class

3.1.2 The types of communicative speaking tasks to consolidate and improve vocabulary

Most of the surveyed students and teachers confirmed that communicative speaking tasks had ever been employed to review and develop the students’ vocabulary To make it clearer, the second question asked these participants what types of communicative speaking tasks were often used, and the results were shown in Figure 2

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90

Students' responses

A: Reaching a consensus D: Interpersonal exchange B: Relaying instructions E: Story construction

C: Problem solving F: Simulation and role play

Figure 2: Types of communicative speaking tasks

As can be seen from the first graph, the most popular types of communicative speaking tasks were problem solving, simulation and role play with the choice of 3/4 teachers In the second place, a half of the teachers often applied relaying instructions, interpersonal exchange and story construction in vocabulary lesson The last place - reaching a consensus was employed by only 1 teacher

94 out of 100 first-year students at the department of Finance and Accounting who affirmed the presence of communicative speaking tasks in the vocabulary lesson continued giving their answer on the types of tasks In contrast

to the teachers’ responses of problem solving, simulation and role play, the majority of students (nearly 70 students) said that they often took part in the task

of interpersonal exchange Simulation and role play, and story construction were put in the second place with the answer of more than 1/3 students Then reaching a consensus and problem solving were placed in the next positions, respectively 23 and 20 choices Standing at the bottom of rank was relaying instructions

As regards the information from the interviews, the teachers stated that problem solving and role play were often applied in their lesson to consolidate and improve students’ vocabulary Besides, teacher B often used other types such as

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interpersonal exchange and reaching a consensus in her class The interviewed students also mentioned many types of communicative speaking tasks used by their teachers, namely discussion, problem solving, interpersonal exchange, role play, presentation and debate, etc Student S4 stated “My teacher uses many communicative speaking tasks, especially problem solving, discussion in pair or group, and role play” Student S3 added “…short presentation about one topic” What is more, in student S1’ class, teacher used the task of information exchange between students to increase their mutual understanding

In summary, the participants’ answers in the interviews were similar to the results collected from survey In details, problem solving, interpersonal exchange, simulation and role play were the most popular types of communicative speaking tasks often employed to consolidate and improve students’ vocabulary according

to the answers of both the teachers and the students

3.1.3 The participants’ interest in the types of communicative speaking tasks

After the common types of communicative speaking tasks in vocabulary lesson were revealed, the next question was to investigate the interest of the teachers and the students in these tasks The results are presented in the table below:

Table 1: The participants’ interest in the types of communicative speaking tasks (%)

F Simulation and role play 0 0 25 50 25 0 9 21 42 28

Note: 1 Very uninterested; 2 Uninterested; 3 Neutral; 4 Interested; 5 Very interested

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From the table, it can be said that the participants’ interest in communicative speaking tasks is quite similar to each other The most favorite task is simulation and role play As much as 75% of teachers and 70% of students considered it the interest and the most interest In addition to the task “simulation and role play”, the teachers were equally interested in problem solving and story construction In the second place, interpersonal exchange and story construction were the favorite tasks of about 2/3 students Meanwhile, only a half of the teachers preferred the task of interpersonal exchange Problem solving was put in the next rank of interest with the answer of 58 students although it was regarded one of the most favored tasks of the teachers Then it is relaying instructions with approximately 50% of neutral options from both the participants, but it still got the preference of the teachers and the students, respectively 25% and 36% Surprisingly, reaching a consensus is at the bottom of tasks in which a half of the teachers and nearly a

third of the students did not show much interest in this kind of task

When being asked about the interest in the types of communicative speaking tasks, teacher A showed her great interest in role play because “it’s very fun and creative This activity requires SS spend time finding the ideas, collecting vocabulary, practicing both Ss’ speaking skills, interaction between members in

groups, creative thinking and emotional expression” The other teacher was

interested in problem solving which gave students chance to deal with the real situations in life and get experience from it What is more, students can improve their vocabulary and speaking skills through discussion with their classmates

In comparison to the answer of the surveyed students, the results in the interview part were not much different when they most showed their interest in role play, discussion, problem solving and interpersonal exchange The students S1 and S4 said that they really preferred discussion and problem solving because these tasks were quite close to life, and could help group members assist each other Additionally, “exciting atmosphere in group discussion makes the vocabulary lesson more interesting” Students S2 and S3 stated that their preferred

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tasks were some kind of interpersonal exchange and role play because they already had certain vocabulary about it, so they can express their ideas in the conversation Moreover, they can extend vocabulary and get some useful experience in solving daily life situations

In summary, problem solving, interpersonal exchange, story construction, simulation and role play are the most interesting tasks according to the opinions of the participants When applying communicative speaking tasks to consolidate and improve students’ vocabulary, the teachers should pay more attention to the students’ favorite tasks in order to encourage their participation in the tasks

3.1.4 Teachers’ ways of applying communicative speaking tasks to consolidate and improve students’ vocabulary

The way teachers applied to consolidate and improve students’ vocabulary through communicative speaking tasks was not the same because it depends on many factors such as teachers’ teaching method, students’ level, lesson theme and specific task, etc However, from the results of the survey and interview, it can be concluded that there were the common stages to consolidate and improve students’ vocabulary through communicative speaking tasks First of all, the teachers led the students to the topic by asking questions or using pictures Then, they gave a real situation for the students to think of solutions From that, the students could retrieve the vocabulary they had already learnt The teachers could help the students by asking questions and writing down some key words on the board Through interaction process, the teachers could provide the students the new words relating to the topic It was also considered a speaking model for the other students to understand and follow After that, the teachers asked the students to work in pairs or groups to solve the problem by themselves It was a good way for the students to increase team cooperation and develop their communicative skills when they had to persuade or protect their point of view against other classmates While the students were doing the tasks, the teachers observed and supported weak

3.2 Research question 2: What are the advantages of communicative speaking tasks in consolidating and improving vocabulary as perceived by the teachers and the students?

3.2.1 The teachers’ perception of the advantages of applying communicative speaking tasks

Statement

perceived by

4 teachers

Strongly disagree (1pt)

Disagree

(2pts)

Don’t know (3pts)

Agree

(4pts)

Strongly agree (5pts)

On average

Table 2: Advantages of applying communicative speaking tasks to consolidate and

improve students’ vocabulary as perceived by the teachers

Table 2 indicated the teachers’ general perceptions of the advantages of consolidating and improving vocabulary through applying communicative speaking tasks From the column “On average”, it is clear that the first position belonged to the statements 2 and 8 The majority of teachers (4.75 points) agreed

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that using communicative speaking tasks made the lesson exciting and close to real life, and promoted learners’ communicative competence Because the final goal of teaching language is to help the learners communicate well, so using communicative speaking tasks brings the specific benefits to the students in improving their communicative ability in English In the second place, with the number of 4.5 points on average, using communicative speaking tasks was highly appreciated by many teachers in which vocabulary was taught in authentic contexts, thus it gave students a more accurate understanding of words’ meaning and use Then, in the same third place with 4.25 points, the other good points of communicative speaking tasks were mentioned in the statements 1,3,4,7 In particular, using communicative speaking tasks helped attract students’ attention

to the vocabulary lesson, retrieve their vocabulary, make them acquire vocabulary knowledge naturally and provide them more opportunities to speak in real life situations In addition, there were some of remarkable advantages of using communicative speaking tasks to consolidate and improve vocabulary such as enlarging students’ vocabulary size through interaction, making them adopt the responsibility to their own learning and encouraging them to discover the forms and structures of target language for themselves (3.75 points), and prompting the development of learners’ spirit of team cooperation and cultivating learners’ individuality by expressing their different views and ideas freely in the conversational interactions between them (3.5 points)

In terms of the information from two interviewed teachers, they also shared the same opinions as those of the questionnaire They emphasized the advantages

of attracting students to the lesson Teacher B stated “When I apply communicative speaking tasks into lessons, my students are very eager to join in activities” More importantly, “through interaction with friends and teachers, they share and know how to use the vocabulary correctly in context.”

In conclusion, the teachers all found the strong points of consolidating and improving vocabulary through communicative speaking tasks They were making

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the lesson interesting and close to life, attracting students to the lesson, retrieving and extending students’ vocabulary, developing their speaking and communication skills in group work

3.2.2 The students’ perception of the advantages of applying communicative speaking tasks

Statement

perceived by

100 students

Strongly disagree (1pt)

Disagree

(2pts)

Don’t know (3pts)

Agree

(4pts)

Strongly agree (5pts)

On average

Table 3: Advantages of applying communicative speaking tasks to consolidate and

improve students’ vocabulary as perceived by the students

As could be seen from table 3, the collected ideas from the students, to some extent, were similar to the teachers’ views In the first position with 4.08 points of agreement, the surveyed students were in favor of the advantage that through communicative speaking tasks, vocabulary was taught in authentic contexts, so students could have more understanding of words’ meaning and use Meanwhile, this advantage was only put in the second place according to the teachers’ opinions Then, the other benefits of communicative speaking tasks in the statements 8, 3 and 2 were agreed by most of the students In details, they all

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thought that communicative speaking tasks helped promote students’ communicative competence, retrieved the vocabulary already learnt and made the lesson exciting and close to real life as well The average points were 4.01, 4.00

and 3.97 correlatively In the next places, students agreed and strongly agreed that

using communicative speaking tasks helped attract students’ attention to the vocabulary lesson, and could enlarge the vocabulary size through interaction between students and teachers as well as between students themselves Moreover, students could acquire vocabulary naturally when they were provided opportunities to speak in real life situations Especially, communicative speaking tasks could develop students’ team cooperation together with the individuality by expressing their different views and ideas freely in the conversational interactions between them, and students must be responsible for their own learning in discovering the forms and structures of target language for themselves

When being asked about the advantages of communicative speaking tasks to consolidate and improve students’ vocabulary, four interviewed students gave their common views on some strong points of using communicative in vocabulary lesson In particular, student S1 commented “using communicative speaking tasks makes the lesson close and interesting to students’ life Besides, it motivates students to learn and pay attention to the lesson Students can study new words in

a natural way They can develop both speaking and presentation skills Especially,

it encourages students’ communicative ability” When discussing with their teacher and classmates about the tasks, students’ vocabulary could be consolidated and improved because they had to retrieve the words they had already learnt to talk and also ask for support from their friends and teacher for new words In addition to these mentioned advantages, communicative speaking tasks were said

to help improve students’ pronunciation and team work

To sum up, both the teachers and the students showed their strong agreement

on the major advantages of communicative speaking tasks which were to make the lesson closer and more interesting, attract students to the task, consolidate and